


i hear them whisper (you won't believe it)

by dalmatienne



Category: Men's Hockey RPF
Genre: Biz Nasty the Horse - Freeform, First Kiss, Humor, M/M, more horses, you simply won't believe how many horses there are
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-07
Updated: 2019-04-07
Packaged: 2019-12-30 10:49:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,377
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18313961
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dalmatienne/pseuds/dalmatienne
Summary: Erik Johnson can talk to horses. More accurately, horses talk tohim. And they won't stop giving him romantic advice.Or, "Straight From The Horse's Mouth"





	i hear them whisper (you won't believe it)

**Author's Note:**

  * In response to a prompt by [venvephe](https://archiveofourown.org/users/venvephe/pseuds/venvephe) in the [wesmashing](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/wesmashing) collection. 



> **Prompt:**
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> Erik Johnson can talk to horses. More accurately, horses talk to _him_. And they won't stop giving him romantic advice.
> 
>  
> 
> If you recognize your name in this story, please, for the love of all things holy and good, click away now. This is entirely a work of fiction.
> 
> Behold, I took a slightly cracky prompt and turned it semi-serious. _My brand_. Venvephe, I hope this is everything you wanted (?) and more (???) ! As always, shout out to [Mythisea](https://archiveofourown.org/users/mythisea) for the beta. This story vaguely follows the 2018-2019 season, but was obviously written prior to playoffs so. Also, I think I had Gravy called up early in this but I refuse to feel remorseful for that.

**i.**

The first time it happens, Erik is Facetiming Biz Nasty in the Pepsi Center home locker room.

Okay, wait, back up.

Let’s clear the air here.

Erik is not FaceTiming his horse. He is not a horsemom, or horsedad, or whatever. Biz Nasty is not his furbaby. Just, his trainer had texted Erik about a persistent sore in the horse’s mouth and Erik wanted to see what was going on with his own two eyes, make sure Biz was alright. He couldn’t very well fly out to the ranch, not in the middle of the pre-season. FaceTiming was the next best thing.

That’s all.

So here he is, FaceTiming his _trainer_ who is obligingly holding the phone up to Biz Nasty’s velvety nose and big horsey teeth as she narrates the horse’s reactions to the different bits.

“Have we tried resting him from the bits entirely?”

The audio crackles with Kelly’s sigh as she patiently responds from off-camera, “Yes. The sore goes away after two or three days but it flares up again as soon as we reintroduce any bit.”

Erik wants to respond, wants to follow up on what Kelly suggests the next steps should be, but all at once there is one whole Nathan MacKinnon pushing his way into Erik’s space. He’s nothing but broad shoulders and thick muscles and earnest eyes when he quirks a grin at Erik and asks, “Are you playing more horse games on your phone?”

“Please, Nathan, the adults are talking here,” Erik says, elevating the phone just out of Nate’s line of vision. He can and will use his few inches of height difference without remorse.

“First of all, this is a public space, and second of all, that is a horse.”

“An _adult_ horse, and you are interrupting our very important conversation. Does your mother know you’re being this rude? Does _Sidney Crosby_ know? What would he say, knowing that you are shirking your responsibility as a Canadian national treasure to be polite at all times?”

“Hop off my dick, EJ,” Nate grumbles but he’s still grinning, eyes crinkling at the corners as he ambles off to join Tyson in harassing Gabe.

Almost unintentionally, Erik watches him move across the room. He’s bulked up over the summer, packing muscle on his shoulders and thighs. He looks good, tan and golden from days spent on lakes and beaches. The bad season still weighs on him—still weighs on them all, even the newest batch of underbaked rookies—but he looks fresh-faced and ready to take on the world. Erik can’t help but think Nate looks like the kind of leader whose men would go to war for him. Or go to their knees.

“Oh god, gross. I wish I could throw up because that longing look on your face is sickening.”

Erik jolts at the sudden male voice. Defensive, he looks around, but no one is looking in his general direction, too busy shoving and chirping at each other. Before he can shrug it off as some sort of weird auditory hallucination, the voice speaks again.

“Is _this_ why you were moping around every time you came to the stables this summer? You got a case of the Nathan MacKinnon blues? Jesus Christ, man, grow some fucking balls already.”

Erik zeroes back in on his phone, where the voice seems to be coming from, but it’s still just showing the FaceTime of Biz Nasty. As he watches, the horse shakes his mane and opens his mouth as if to whinny or knicker and—

“Go get your fucking dick wet or something, man, you’re not a gelding. Or, oh shit, dude, do you not have a harem? Fucking weak.”

The horse’s mouth is still moving, long yellow teeth flashing behind velvety lips. When Erik squints, he can’t see any fishing line tied to the teeth or peanut butter tucked against the gums or any other Mr. Ed shit.

“Listen,” the horse, fucking _Biz Nasty_ , says consolingly, “if you need help asking him out, don’t worry. I’ve got connections, I’ve got a whole fucking network. I’ll spread the word around and you’ll be mounting him in no time. Or he’ll be mounting you. I’m a modern horse, I don’t give a shit. Brave new world and all that.”

In the background, Kelly is still talking like she doesn’t hear the horse talk so EJ just shrugs it off as a long-term effect of slamming his head into boards for two and a half decades and gives Kelly the go ahead to follow the vet’s recommendations before ending the call.

He stares at the phone for a few moments before slipping it into his bag and beginning to unbutton his dress shirt.

Horses don’t talk.

Even if they did, they wouldn’t know _shit_ about what feelings Erik may or may not allegedly have about Nathan MacKinnon.

* * *

The Avs win the game that night, thank fucking _god_ , making up for the shitshow of the first Wild pre-season game. Erik doesn’t get on the board, but Nate does with the primary assist on Rants’ game-winner. Riding that sweet wave of _fuck-the-Wild_ , they hit up one of the local bars. The team spreads out across the joint, the rookies sidling up to the bar with the vets commandeering one of the corner booths. Erik mocks Gabe for how he is _glowing_ with matrimonial bliss and casually drapes an arm along the top of the booth, just behind the broad line of Nate’s shoulders.

He carefully drinks enough to forget about the whole phone call from earlier that day.

It’s fine.

This is gonna be _their_ season.

 

**ii.**

Even under pain of death Erik would never admit this, but the Avs’ PR and social media teams are rock fucking solid. They can make even the blandest player appear to have a personality, and they give Gabe ample opportunity to make an ass out of himself, which Erik personally appreciates.

And Erik isn’t just being nice because they’re doing a bit on teambuilding during a trail ride.

“You bribed them to do this, didn’t you?” Nate says as he eyes up the horses that are being tacked up across the yard.

They’re at a ranch in Idaho Springs, just at the foot of the Rockies. It’s a beautiful day in early November, unseasonably warm with a cool breeze rustling through the pines and yellow aspens. It is a glorious day for trail riding, if Erik does say so himself. Lauren and Emily have cornered the two Tysons to talk about their experiences with riding—Erik can _see_ the effort it’s taking both of them not to be complete horndogs on camera, and it is glorious—leaving Erik, Nate, and Gabe to wander the ranch. Gabe is...off doing something nefarious, Erik is sure.

“I’m sure I have no idea what you mean, dear Nathaniel.”

Nate huffs and his cheeks pinken up and Erik—

Erik should be used to this by now, the way his stomach swoops like he’s some goddamn teenager with a crush on the quarterback.

“You know that’s not even my name. But seriously, what did you promise Lauren? Are you going to do an exclusive on your chest hair?” Eyebrow quirked, Nate’s eyes drag down Erik’s chest but Erik just waves him off.

“Uh-uh, Nate, you know the rules. Two can keep a secret only if one of them is dead. Ah, our fair captain approaches. Hail, Landeskog!”

“Stick a cork in it Johnson,” Gabe says mildly as he lopes over. He slips his phone back into his back pocket which is, frankly, impressive given how tight the pants are.

Lauren rounds them up before Erik can really get into it with Gabe, herding all the boys into a loose circle with easy confidence that a sheepdog would envy. Erik allows himself to be mic’d up and powdered down. The social media interns are still bright-eyed and awestruck, not yet jaded by the less-than-glamorous world of trying to get professional athletes to be more personable than a brick wall. Erik sends the one working on his mic wires a gummy smile. They go bright red and fumble the mic.

How precious.

Once they’re all mic’d up, Lauren claps her hands to get their attention. Her red hair shines brightly in the sunlight. One of the trail guides from the ranch, a woman in her forties with a real Stetson and a kind smile, waves at them from her spot next to Lauren.

“Listen up guys, this is how it’s going to go. We’ve got Morgan here from the ranch who’s going to lead you on a trail ride through this park. Some of the trails are pretty narrow so instead of having a full camera crew following you, we’re just going to give you GoPros once you’re all saddled up. Don’t get too nervous about the cameras, just have fun.” She says this in a vaguely threatening way, which Erik can respect.

Morgan steps up, in weathered boots and a flannel, and talks them through what the ride will be like, how to handle the horses, and so on.

“The horses have ridden this trail at least a hundred times, so when in doubt, just let the reins go loose and try not to kick the horses.” She tips her hat up and smiles at them. “They won’t wander, they’ll just follow me and my girl.”

Next, Morgan takes a show of hands to see who’s ridden a horse before and the boys all snort at Erik when he proudly raises his hand even though Gabe and Nate’s hands go up as well. Morgan just gives him a sunny smile and tells them to follow her to where the horses are tacked up and waiting.

The horses prick their ears up when they approach. They swish their tails and shake out their manes but they don’t say anything.

Like, they don’t whicker or anything.

Of course they don’t say anything. They’re _horses_.

“We’ll start with one of the beginners,” Morgan says as she walks up to one of the horses. She’s a deep chestnut color with strong legs and bright eyes. Erik doesn’t mean to brag, but he’d put good money on her being a quarter horse.

“Weird flex, but okay,” Nate whispers back when Erik says this.

“Tyson. Jost,” Morgan clarifies with a laugh when they both step forward. Josty sticks his tongue out at Barrie and approaches the horse. Erik watches as Morgan walks him through mounting the horse. Josty’s sneakers keep slipping out of the stirrups and he’s holding the reins all wrong, but the horse patiently stands still as Morgan corrects him.

Erik looks around, taking in the horses and the ranch. Emily’s recording Morgan and Josty for insta or twitter, and Erik makes a mental note to leave a few incendiary comments later. His eyes swing over to Lauren. She’s grinning, tapping away at her phone, and her smile, when she looks up at him, is positively feral.

This would be incredibly suspicious if Erik wasn’t used to her looking like this every time one of the boys was seconds away from making an ass of themselves. He just hopes it isn’t him this time.

“Doing great, Tyson!” Morgan cheers and when Erik looks back, Josty has nudged the horse into a slow walk around the circular corral. He looks shaky but proud, throwing up a peace sign when Barrie raises his phone to take a snap for the boys. Once Josty completes the circuit, Morgan turns to rest of them, hands on her hips. “Who’s next?”

* * *

The horse that Erik is assigned, thankfully, is tall as hell. His coat is a patchwork of fawn and cream, the mane and tail mostly cream in color. He’s muscular and big boned, his hooves solid and wide. Basically, the best possible trail riding horse for a 6’5” giant hockey player.

“What an absolute unit,” Josty says from where he’s precariously balanced in his saddle.

“Lorge,” Nate agrees solemnly.

Erik flips them both off before gripping the reins in one hand and the horn in the other. He puts his foot in the stirrup and swings himself up and into the saddle. The horse snorts and takes a few shuffling steps to adjust to his rider.

From just in front of him, someone mutters, “Weak-ass technique, bitch.”

Sitting up straight in his saddle, Erik clutches a hand to throat in mostly mock but somewhat real offense.

“Excuse me? Who the _fuck_ called my technique _weak_? Let’s square up.”

Erik looks first to Gabe, but he just looks quietly bemused, patiently waiting in his saddle as an intern hands him a GoPro. Barrie looks equally innocent, which is to say: not at all. Beside him, Nate nudges his horse forward and says, “We wouldn’t _dare_ question your technique, Horsemaster Eric.”

The boys all laugh and Erik rolls his eyes like, whatever. He turns forward in his saddle and that’s when he sees that his horse has craned its neck around as far as it can and is watching him with one wide eye. His horsey mouth is dropped open in comical, almost human surprise. Erik pats it reassuringly on the shoulder and the horse distinctly says, “Hey, uh, what the fuck?”

Erik blinks at the horse. The horse blinks back at him.

“Well, shit,” Erik says and rubs at the back of his neck.

* * *

The horse tells Erik his name is Cimarron.

“Morgan calls me Moony but I don’t think it accurately reflects the wild regality of my heritage.”

“Oh my god,” Barrie’s horse whinnies just ahead of them, “Moony is trying to claim he’s a real mustang again.”

“Oh come off it, Moons,” Gabe’s horse hollers from the tail end of the line they’ve formed along the trail. “You’re like, only twelve percent mustang, if that. You wouldn’t know real mustang blood if it knocked you off your hooves while you were asleep.”

“Eat my ass, rocklickers,” Moony-but-actually-Cimarron grumbles before going quiet in a sulk.

Erik does his level best to breathe through the fever dream his life has become. Hearing animals talk is definitely not normal. Maybe he actually fell out of his saddle earlier and the resulting coma is the cause of this. Maybe there’s a tumor the size of a puck growing in his brain. Maybe he’s developing late-onset schizophrenia or early-onset dementia. Maybe—

“Hey.”

Nate’s pulled his horse up beside him despite the narrowness of the trail. The difference in height is especially apparent since Moony-but-actually-Cimarron is almost a hand taller than Nate’s horse.

It takes more thought than usual but Erik dredges up a smirk for him. “What’s up, Nate Mac? Do you finally know joy, now that you’ve ridden a horse?”

“I’ve ridden a horse before, asshole,” Nate says as he reaches across the space and shoves at him. He does not, Erik notes, elaborate on _when_ he’s been riding before. “Just… You don’t seem quite as happy as we thought you’d be, doing a whole bit on horse riding. Tys already lost a lot of money because he bet that you would have shared at least two quotes about how majestic horses are by now.”

“No hour of life is wasted that is spent in the saddle,” Erik prattles off dutifully, snickering and leaning away as Nate tries to slug him.

“You’re such a dick,” Nate says, smiling, and pushes his horse ahead of Erik as an outcropping of rock narrows the trail even more. Erik watches him ride off, taking in the way his thighs squeeze around his horse’s sides, the gentle bounce of his ass in the seat. Jesus.

“Your concern means a lot to me, Nate,” Erik yells at him, laughing.

His laugh is cut short when Moony-but-actually-Cimarron turns to stare at him and trips over an exposed root, jolting Erik in the saddle.

“Wait,” the horse says before Erik can figure out a way to tell him to keep his eyes on the trail. “You’re _Erik_?”

“What?” Erik hisses under his breath, resisting the urge to look over his shoulder to see if Josty can also hear his fucking talking horse.

“Erik. Like, Biz Nasty’s Erik. Listen bitch, I got some ideas about how to help you out.”

Suddenly, horrifically, it all clicks. That afternoon months ago when Erik had hallucinated his _fucking racehorse_ telling him he needed to get his dick wet. The implication that Erik needed _help_ getting laid. The idea that, with the help of Biz Nasty’s connections, Nate would—

Well, the whole thing is fucking insane.

“You’ve gotta be kidding me,” Erik grumbles. Ahead of him, Nate turns around to give him a sweetly confused face. He turns around again with a roll of his eyes when Erik sticks his tongue out obscenely between the gap in his teeth.

The Avs social media team is going to get _great_ footage from him.

“No, really,” Moony-but-actually-Cimarron insists, “I’ve got the _best_ plan. It always works, you just have to trust me.”

“Absolutely not.”

“Just leave it all to me, I promise you’re in good hands. Hooves.”

“Are you saying that it would _behoove_ me to go along with this?”

Moony-but-actually-Cimarron stops dead in his tracks, causing Josty’s horse to almost crash into them with a muttered, “Watch where you’re going, hay-for-brains!” The horse cranes its neck around to glare at Erik with one narrowed brown eye.

“Don’t be fucking speciesist, Erik.”

* * *

Erik can’t remember the last time he was nervous around horses. He spends every free day he has over the summer at his ranch, spending time with his horses as well as the neighbors’ boarded horses. Even during the season he reads articles and books about horse body language. It’s taken him years, but he can read the signs of a single ear flick, a tail twitch, a hoof stomp, almost as well as he can read the body language of his teammates on the ice. These small movements speak volumes to Erik, and he knows when to back off, when to tighten down, when to loosen up.

That’s why it’s so fucking ironic that when the horses do speak to him—when they open their big horsey mouths and show off their big horsey teeth and the fucking English language comes out instead of normal horse noises—Erik has no idea what to do.

* * *

The rest of the trail ride is easy enough. Now that they’re more comfortable in the saddle, the boys start fucking around some more, making jokes and hamming it up for the GoPros. Erik comes back to himself enough to chirp them to hell and back for their riding techniques. They reach a stretch of meadow and the horses fan out, no longer in a straight line.

Barrie’s next to Erik and they’re both making fun of Gabe for only knowing how to ride because of all the romantic horseback rides he’s taken Mel on. Nate nudges his horse in between the two of them to get in on the chirping. Gabe flips them all off and continues looking beautiful in the saddle.

“Psst. Erik.”

Ah shit. It’s the horse again.

Except, when Erik looks down, it’s not Moony-but-actually-Cimarron. It’s Sugar, Nate’s light grey dappled mare. She’s beautiful and strong and Erik has _got_ to stop before he starts making comparisons between horse and rider.

“Erik,” she says again. Her voice is sweet and soft, lilting just enough that Erik finds himself involuntarily smiling down at her. She blinks her dark eyes up at him beguilingly, thick white eyelashes fluttering. “This is the kind of boy you’ll want to ride bareback. There’s a saddle between us but I can just _tell_ he has a monster of a wrench.”

The horses all burst into braying laughter. Josty startles so badly he almost falls out of the saddle, saved only by an athlete’s quick reflexes and the high back of a western saddle. Erik can feel his cheeks go pale and flushed in quick succession.

Morgan wheels her horse around from the edge of the meadow and comes up, a bemused look on her face. “Huh,” she says, “the horses aren’t usually this vocal. How strange!”

“You’re telling me,” Erik grumbles. It takes several nudges to Moony-but-actually-Cimarron’s sides before the horse stops laughing and moves forward.

* * *

They ride out of the meadow and back into a more forested area, winding their way back to the ranch. The trail is a little muddy from a recent rainstorm, and Erik can hear the mud sucking at the horses’ hooves. Moony-but-actually-Cimarron and Sugar fuck around enough to put Erik and Nate solidly at the back of the pack.

“So much for Erik the Horsemaster,” Barrie calls out when Moony-but-actually-Cimarron tosses his head and yanks the reins out of Erik’s hand for the third time.

“Can any one man truly master a horse?” Erik snarks back serenely but _jesus_ this is frustrating.

“Of all people, I would put my money on you,” Nate says to him in a falsely sweet tone Erik would be proud of if it wasn’t directed at him.

“Nate, please, leave the horse-betting to the experts.” 

The banter is gentle and familiar and Erik finds himself relaxing in the saddle again. Pine scent rises around them as the horses plod down the trail, the gentle swaying of Moony-but-actually-Cimarron’s pace putting him at ease. Sometimes Erik forgets how much he really does love horseback riding.

Suddenly Sugar’s voice rises up behind him, high and foreboding.

“Here?”

“Perfect,” Moony-but-actually-Cimarron whickers back, slowing his pace from an easy walk to a slow plodding.

“I’m ready!”

“What are you doing?” Erik hisses, bending low over the horse’s neck.

Moony-but-actually-Cimarron flicks an ear dismissively. He whispers, “You know what this is for.”

And then he rears back so suddenly that Erik can’t even try to hold on, the reins slack in his hands. He fumbles forward to grab at the horn, but he’s too late and too off-balance. The high back of the saddle does little to prevent his fall aside from bruising his tailbone. He lands ass first in the mud and he’s too shocked to comprehend what just happened.

Moony-but-actually-Cimarron is kind enough to not step backwards and trample him with his hooves.

There’s a beat of silence, then— 

Nate nearly laughs himself out of his saddle. Hunched over Sugar’s neck, his face is bright red with tears streaming down his cheeks. It’s not attractive at all, Erik tells himself dazedly. Especially not from this angle, where he can nearly see up Nate’s nose.

It’s a good looking nose, though.

Moony-but-actually-Cimarron circles around and bends his neck to nudge his nose at where Erik is lying sprawled out in the mud. Erik is abruptly reminded of that one scene in the second Lord of the Rings movie, and he doesn’t particularly like it.

“Huh,” the horse snorts, genuinely perplexed. “That usually works. I thought for sure he would jump to your rescue.”

“Fuck. Off,” Erik tells both Nate and the horse. He allows himself another few minutes to lie in the mud and pray desperately for deliverance.

* * *

His ego is as bruised as his ass when he gets home. He doesn’t even stop in the kitchen for something to drink before he tips onto the couch in an exhausted sprawl. Morgan had apologized profusely for Moony-but-actually-Cimarron throwing him, had insisted that he’d never thrown anyone before. Erik had waved her off, said that he thought he saw a snake on the trail and that must have spooked Moony-but-actually-Cimarron.

The stupid horse may have thrown him, but he had good intentions. Or something.

A wet nose nudges at his dirty hand and Erik cracks an eye to look down. Large liquid eyes look back up at him and the dogs wag their tails hesitantly when they notice they have his attention. Erik squints at them suspiciously.

“Please don’t tell me you have any opinions on my love life, too.”

The dogs woof gently and lick at his hands but otherwise remain silent.

At least something is still right in the world.

* * *

Emily is kind enough not to include his spill in any of the tweets or snapchats she posts that day.

Lauren holds no such qualms and soon his twitter and insta mentions are nothing but hastily-made gifs of him sliding off the back of a horse, his arms windmilling comically. It’s all from the point of view of Nate’s GoPro.

Erik can’t even be mad at her; he would have done the same thing if he was in her position.

 

**iii.**

The thing is, now that it’s started, _it won’t stop_.

The horses keep popping up everywhere and they all have something to say.

Erik’s walking around downtown Phoenix with the boys on a rare afternoon off and two police horses stop him to prosthelytize about the wonders of _big, romantic gestures, Erik, show him that you care!_

A carriage horse in Denver almost upends her carriage when she tries to follow Erik into a grocery store, shouting about expensive gifts and how _something big and shiny and exorbitantly pricey usually does the trick, Erik, take my word on this, I’ve seen my fair share of proposals!_

There’s a big rodeo weekend going on in Dallas that happens to coincide with a game, and Erik nearly tears his hair out from the sheer number of horses suggesting pickup lines to him on the street.

Erik gets into a whole-ass fight with a pony at a pop-up petting zoo in San Jose— 

(“He’s out of your league. You don’t even have all of your teeth.”

“You are a worn out petting zoo pony, don’t talk to me about teeth.”

“ _Fine_. Then I guess you _don’t_ want my advice.”

“No! I don’t! I never asked for any advice!”

“I thought you humans were all about not looking gift horses in the mouth.”)

—and he has had enough.

How the _fuck_ does his goddamn racehorse know every other horse on the North American continent?

* * *

The benefit of being a professional ice hockey player in the National Hockey League—other than the fame, the fortune, and the beautiful, petite, blonde, eerily identical women, even if Erik is only interested in a few of those adjectives and not at all in the noun—is that Erik doesn’t have to worry about horses showing up at his place of employment without warning. 

Horses and ice rinks are not, traditionally, a good combination.

Similarly, horses are rarely found in airports or on chartered flights. And, with their annual visit to the Children’s Hospital coming up, Erik is fairly confident in thinking there won’t be any horses present to harass him. He’ll be harassed enough as it is, confronted by Nate holding babies and gently crouching down to talk with some bright-eyed kid.

* * *

“There is a horse loose in this hospital,” Gravy hisses at them as soon as the second half of the team steps off the elevator. His coltish limbs are tucked in close to his body and his eyes are wide with terror.

Nate elbows Erik in the ribs, a gentle nudging thing much less painful than the blows Erik’s seen him exchange with Tys.

“Sounds right up your alley.”

“I am more than just my love of horses. My interests are vast and varied, Nathan.”

“Oh?”

“Are you saying you want to find out what else is right up my alley?”

And Erik needs to stop this because they are in a children’s hospital, where there are _children._ And, apparently, a horse. A pointy elbow catches him in his side as Kerf maneuvers his way to the front of the group. 

“Wait, there’s a horse loose in the hospital?”

“I saw it use the elevator,” Gravy confirms gravely, his eyes darting glances down the corridor. 

“I didn’t know horses could do that.”

Before they can further discuss the horse, they are gathered up by the Avs PR people and the hospital’s liaison. They’re disinfected and scrubbed down and split into groups: Colin, Barbs, and Barrie go to hold some babies while the rookies are led to the slightly older kids. Erik, meanwhile, is paired up with an image that will haunt him until his dying breath, a vision seared onto both his eyelids and the membranes of his heart: Nate sitting on a minuscule plastic chair, his lap occupied by a little girl with big blue eyes and a gap-toothed smile. She looks so small against Nate’s bulk and honestly, Erik is emotionally compromised here.

He loves kids, wants to even have some one day, but Nate grinning down at the little girl and then up at him punches him in the fucking gut.

Erik can only stand so much.

* * *

He ducks out of the playroom, mumbling that he needs a drink of water when Emily sends him a concerned glance from behind her phone. The water fountain is in the same hallway as the playroom, but tucked into an awkward alcove just past an empty nurse station. It’s dusty and almost forgotten, and far too short for Erik to reach in a respectable way. He presses his forehead against the metal paneling just above the fountain and takes several deep, centering breaths.

It almost helps, up until someone behind him clears their throat, causing him to jump. Erik spins around and honestly, he’s not even _surprised_ to see that the tiniest fucking horse he’s ever seen has cornered him in this badly lit hallway.

There are knock-off converses on its hooves and a small top hat is nestled between its ears. Its handler is nowhere to be found.

The halogen lights above them fizzle and hum.

The tiny horse turns pale blue, almost lamp-like eyes toward Erik. A shiver seizes him and Erik finds he can’t look away from its frail piebald body.

“Do you have a fan?” the horse asks. Its voice is high and thin, childlike and entirely genderless. It holds itself extremely still, almost hauntingly so. Erik is so used to seeing horses in constant motion: muscles bunching and lengthening, tails swishing, ears flicking. This horse, though, is so motionless.

Erik is beginning to understand why Gravy was so frightened of it being loose in the hospital: it looks like some kind of omen of death, but with a jaunty little top hat.

“If you had a fan, you might flirt with it. Use it to say what you cannot.”

The horse hasn’t blinked once since cornering Erik by the water fountain. Erik glances back towards the playroom and says, “I’ve got plenty of fans, but not in the way you’re thinking, bud.”

Something shifts in the horse’s expression but Erik cannot for the life of him figure out what. It makes him nervous. 

“You can tap your fan to your lips, so that he knows that you would like to talk with him. It is the only proper way to do this, Erik.”

“Proper? Have you met me?” The edge of the water fountain digs into his leg; he doesn’t remember backing into it.

The horse continues as if Erik hadn’t spoken at all. “After introductions have been made, you may allow him to take you on a promenade, but you mustn’t touch, not unless the road is uneven and he offers a hand for balance.”

“Bud,” Erik says, gently, because the horse seems so frail and off-putting, “We’ve known each other for years.”

The horse cocks its head in a sudden jarring movement.

“Years?”

“I’ve known him since he was like an infant. I was already on the team when he was drafted, I got to see his very first baby steps on the ice, so to speak. See him grow into himself, become the face of the franchise. I’m older than him, I’m afraid he’ll outgrow me. He deserves so much more than a half-washed out defenseman.”

Erik trails off, shoulders hunched and hands tucked awkwardly into his jeans pockets. The horse barely comes up to his knees but he feels trapped in the water fountain alcove, like he’s facing something so much larger than a small, possibly possessed therapy pony. Like he’s looking into the glassy ice blue eyes of the horse and seeing his own insecurities and doubts and self-loathing reflected back at him.

The feeling is especially spooky because Erik faces these feelings every time he looks in the mirror and he’s usually able to power through it.

As if sensing the wavering of his will, the horse abruptly straightens its head.

“Soap,” it says decisively in its high wavering voice.

The corners of his mouth pull down in a grimace. Erik just exposed the inner workings of his soul, and this is all the horse has to say to him? Soap?

“Are you suggesting that if I change up my personal hygiene routine, Nathan MacKinnon, face of the Colorado Avalanche franchise, will fall madly in love with me?”

There’s a bitterness in his voice that Erik wasn’t expecting, and he flinches from it. The horse seems unmoved.

“In long courtships, it is customary to give small inexpensive gifts, to show that you think of them. Soaps can evoke scent memories, and it can be a secret shared between two lovers: think of how you will feel, knowing that he wears a scent that you chose.”

Before Erik can respond, there’s a shout of relief at the other end of the dim hallway.

“There you are, Oliver!” a person in scrubs cries out and rushes forward to clip a lead to the horse’s halter. The horse remains remarkably still throughout the process. It maintains eye contact with Erik even as the handler combs their fingers through its mane. “We’ve been looking for this little guy everywhere,” the handler says to Erik apologetically. “He’s good with the kids but sometimes he seems to just vanish, slipping away like smoke!”

Erik mechanically laughs along with them, still pinned by those lamplike eyes. The handler tugs at the lead and at last the horse blinks, allowing the handler to lead it back to the playroom. Its tiny sneakers make dull rubbery thuds against the linoleum tiles. Erik shakes himself out of his stupor and follows.

When he enters the playroom, even more children have climbed into Nate’s lap and he’s struggling to hold onto them as he helps a little boy color in a picture of Iron Man at their table. Erik takes a deep breath and sits down next to them. Nate looks up and smiles at him, this crooked sweet grin that’s made all the softer by his lapful of children. Erik’s heart feels dangerously full so he picks up a yellow crayon.

“Hey buddy,” he says to the little boy who seems to be in charge of the coloring sheet, “can I help?”

The kid considers him with solemn wide dark eyes. At last he nods and points to a part of Iron Man’s armor. “That can be gold,” he allows.

“Thanks, bud,” Erik says and presses the waxy tip of the crayon to the paper.

* * *

Between the three of them they finish the Iron Man picture and then a Captain Marvel picture very quickly. The little boy nods at them and clutches the pictures to his chest as he scurries off to show them to one of the nurses. Nate’s lap was vacated a few minutes ago, the tiny therapy horse in the corner much more appealing than two big blond hockey players.

Erik blows out a breath and watches the kids swarm Oliver, patting gently at his tiny horse shoulders and admiring his tiny horse converses. Both the horse and the children look so small and frail, and Erik suddenly feels clumsy and overly large in his six-five body.

“Is that where you disappeared to? You had to go be the horse catcher?”

Erik turns to find Nate already looking back at him. He’s washed out in the unforgiving hospital lights but his grin is still cheeky, the blue of his eyes brought out by the burgundy of his jersey.

“There was a horse, _loose_ , in the hospital, Nathan,” Erik says, gesturing at the tiny pony. “Someone had to do something.”

“And of course that someone had to be you, huh, bud?”

“Horses and I have a special connection.”

Across the room, Oliver slowly turns his neck to stare at Erik with his blank blue eyes.

“Besides,” Erik adds quickly, “I wanted to make sure you had enough one on one time with your peers.”

“My peers— oh, haha. I’m twenty-three, EJ, not five. You’re more immature than me, I know it was you with the shaving cream last week.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“I _saw_ you do it!”

Erik takes one look at Nate’s face, takes in the sudden redness of his cheeks, the furrow of his eyebrows, and smiles sweetly, showing off his teeth. “No collusion,” he says.

When Nate pushes him off the short plastic chair, he’s laughing.

* * *

Eventually the kids and hockey players are rounded up for their final farewell and the Avs and their cameras are herded off to the elevator lobby. Barrie bounds over to Nate to babble about all of the babies he got to hold and Erik finds himself gravitating over to check in on the rookies. Josty and JT are chirping each other, something about mini-scooter races, but Gravy still has a haunted look on his face. Erik slings an arm around him, laughing when he jumps and turns startled brown eyes Erik’s way.

“You good there, rook?”

Gravy visibly swallows and peers down the hallway toward the playroom. Towards the horse, Erik realizes when he turns to see Oliver’s tiny form standing unmoving in the doorway. Even from this distance, the horse’s eyes are eerily blue and bright.

“It’s still here,” Gravy says. His voice is soft and there is a very real undercurrent of fear in his words. “There shouldn’t be a horse in the hospital.”

For all his gangly limbs and delicate features, Gravy is still as tall as Erik. It makes tucking him into his chest awkward, but Erik manages it. “Oh, we’re _well_ past that,” he says. Gravy moans in terror and Erik shushes him. Off to the side, haloed in the fluorescent lights of the elevator bank, Nate raises his eyebrows at them. Erik raises his own right back and gives the rookie in his arms a little shake. “But,” he says, “I think eventually everything is going to be okay.”

He shoves Gravy onto the elevator as soon as it dings open and when he turns for one last look at the horse, it’s gone.

* * *

He’s out with Tyson a week later, a d-man bonding trip that is actually just Erik serving as supervision to make sure Tys doesn’t open another tab at West Elm. Tys is in raptures over a table runner that Erik knows for a fact wouldn’t fit any of the tables Tys currently owns, so he nicks Tys’s wallet and wanders over to the kitschy wholesaler next door.

Erik takes a brief look around and lets out a startled huff of laughter when his eyes land on the display table just off to the side of the store. He picks up a basket and fills it, pulling out Tys’s wallet as he makes his way to the till.

* * *

The next day Erik is careful to be dressed and already skating laps before Nate even makes it to the locker room but that doesn’t stop Nate from boarding him as soon as he hits the ice.

“Johnson, you fucker, are you trying to tell me I _smell_?”

Erik allows himself to be boxed in against the boards, grinning down at Nate. He’s playing at being angry, bright spots of color high on his cheeks. Behind him, the boys circle on the ice. They bump into each other like smoke-drunk honey bees, ineptly keeping their eyes on where the alternate captains are scuffling.

“MacKinnon, you _wound_ me,” Erik says. He can hardly keep the shit-eating grin off his face. “Where _ever_ would you get that idea?”

“I don’t know, maybe the six bars of soap you left gift-wrapped in my stall?”

“Perhaps I got them for you so you won’t feel so homesick for the three weeks of every month that your parents aren’t in town.”

Nate blinks up at him as his mouth drops open a little. Erik can’t help but flick his eyes down to his lips, chapped from the rink air and flushed pink. He cheeks flush a bit more and he rolls his eyes, shoving at Erik one more time before he skates away.

“Fuck off, Johnson,” he calls over his shoulder, but there’s something else in his voice that makes Erik pause.

He can’t quite put his finger on what it is, but it’s something.

 

**iv.**

January and February hit the team hard. They’re playing their hearts out, with not a lot to show for it except for more losses than wins and a handful of loser points. Erik's never been one to point fingers—except at himself, via a handy-dandy tool called the internet—and hockey's a team sport, but there's also a lot to be said about in-net consistence.

Again, not to point fingers. He's not going to vaguepost about it, or bring it up in an interview, or anything.

Still, it's frustrating to see the kids pour their spirits into the team just to get blasted by the media and buffeted by the constant losses. They're good kids with a lot of talent and perseverance and Erik doesn't want to see them beat down.

He's not projecting. He's not. It's just, the kids are still young and a lot is expected of them.

Someone's gotta protect them.

So Erik decides to take them to the zoo.

* * *

It’s risky. Erik knows it’s risky.

There are so many horse-adjacent animals at the zoo, and Erik doesn’t know how wide Biz Nasty’s gossip circle runs.

But it's a good morale boost, like taking the boys clubbing or treating Tyson to Dairy Queen when he starts to look a little wild at the edges.

Erik can put up with a lot for his boys.

* * *

Erik corners some of the rookies in the locker room after morning skate and tells them, in no uncertain terms, that he's taking them on a field trip. Compher and Kerfy looks suspicious but Josty perks right up. It doesn't take much to convince them to meet him at the zoo. They're still just this side of intimidated of him, and Erik is not above using that to his advantage.

He might have also insinuated that skipping out would have resulted in a fine. He's not above that either.

Erik scans the room for any remaining rookies and his eyes land on Sam and Gravy.

“It's mandatory,” Erik says to Gravy, Sam looking on.

“It's really not,” Gabe says gently, like he’s the good parent here. Erik shoos him and his beautiful married face away.

“It's strongly encouraged,” he corrects and pats Gravy's shoulder when his eyes start looking a little too lost and world-weary. How the hell does he manage to look both too-young and too-old for this world? “Text the group chat if you end up coming.”

* * *

It's the middle of the day, so it doesn't take too long to get from practice to the zoo. There are a bunch of families milling around the parking lot, nannies and stay-at-home parents clearly taking advantage of the nice weather. Erik pulls into a spot and reaches back to rummage around in the hockey detritus that covers his back seat. It takes him a few minutes to find what he's looking for and then he hops out of the truck and makes his way to the zoo entrance.

The kids arrive not too long after that, Josty and Compher jostling at each other like second graders with their first crushes while Kerfy and Sam follow at a more sedate pace. 

“Jimothy Timothy,” Erik admonishes from his careful lean against the admissions office wall. “Do not shove your teammate around like that! I will not bail you out of the zoo jail if the zoo police arrest you for disturbing the peace.”

“Zoo jail?”

“In fact,” Erik says over Josty's eager interest in the idea of zoo jail, “we should really address that before we head in. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.”

The children blink at him and Compher says, “What does that mean?”

Erik smiles.

* * *

Amazon Prime, Erik knows, is far too much power for many people to be trusted with. Clothes, food, medicine, weapons, all at the click of a button or tap of a touch screen, all with two-day shipping. Erik could look up the most intricate, intimidating bondage gear and with the flick of his wrist it could be delivered to his doorstep in a mere two business days.

It is _frightening_ how easy it was to buy three adult-sized child leashes, no questions asked.

* * *

“EJ, why do I have to be on the leash?” Kerfy whines even as he slips the leash and attached backpack on.

Erik fastens the handles of the leashes to his wrists, flicking an authoritative glance to Josty and Compher to make sure they follow their fellow’s lead. To Kerf, he says, “You remember what happened the last time we let you wander around unsupervised.”

“What? Is this about the pesto thing in Sweden? That was over a year ago!”

“You could have died, Alexander. We can't let that happen again.”

“In some colleges, if your roommate dies, you get all A's for the semester. If Kerfy dies, do you think the league'd give the Avs a playoff spot?”

They all turn to look at Josty. Erik slips his sunglasses down his nose to stare at him. “Jesus kid, that's morbid.”

There’s a pause as they all seem to consider Josty’s implication, then Compher says, “Why doesn't Sam have to wear a leash?”

“Because Sam is a good boy who can be trusted,” Erik says and smacks a kiss to the top of Sam's curly head. Sam grins up at him angelically and sticks his tongue out at the other boys when Erik can pretend he isn't looking. That's his boy, Erik thinks fondly.

Erik checks his phone one more time and finds a text from Gravy. It's just like the kid himself, overly apologetic and sincere, genuinely sorry that he has to miss the zoo trip because he already has plans with his girlfriend. Erik sends back a quick text, _we'll tell the animals you say hi_ , because he can't bring himself to be too severe on the kid.

Those too-old cow eyes, man.

All told, maybe it's a good thing Gravy couldn't make it. Five rookies to one veteran is a bit much, and besides.

Erik only has the three leashes.

* * *

The kids take to the leashes well enough and Erik only has to sternly admonish them three times to stop getting the lines tangled up. Even Sammy, off-leash as he is, sticks close to the group and is even polite enough to not make it too obvious that he is taking copious snapchats and instastories of his leashed teammates.

Such a good boy.

Not as many people stop them for selfies or autographs as Erik would have expected—another unexpected benefit of the leashes—and their walk through the exhibits is fairly uneventful. The kids take a truly excessive amount of selfies in front of where the lions can be seen lounging in the February sun, half of which they post to insta and tag Landy in.

Erik's hackles rise when they stop by the zebra enclosure, but to his relief none of them call out to him like the horses in Dallas had. The zebra closest to the walkway stares at them for a few seconds, blinking its thick-lashed eyes before shaking out its bristly mane and walking away to the opposite edge of the enclosure. Erik breathes a sigh of relief and lets the kids tug him away to the next exhibit.

At least he doesn’t have to worry about zebras harassing him at the zoo. Enough of that happens on the ice.

They move through the coastal section of the zoo, the rookies chirping at each other and Erik sending big, gummy smiles to anyone who stares too long at three muscular young men being led around the zoo on leashes.

When they get to the otter exhibit, the rookies crowd up against the fence, all loudly exclaiming and pointing as a family of otters hop by, chasing a butterfly. Erik takes a picture of them, the rookies and the otters, and sends it to Nate. Less than a minute later Nate texts back, an extreme close up of Tyson , eyebrows furrowed and mouth open mid-complaint.

 _he’s mad u didn’t invite him_ , Nate’s caption reads.

Erik’s brain does something truly stupid and he types out, _Well he’s not invited but you are_.

In front of him, Compher says in this quiet voice to Josty, “Did you know that otters hold hands so they don’t float away from each other?”

Kerfy’s head snaps to the side to look wide-eyed at his two roommates but all Josty says in return is, “They should consider investing in child leashes.”

Sam mutters in French and walks away. Erik watches something in Compher’s eyes shutter closed, his cheeks flushing to match his hair. A knot of empathy twists in Erik’s heart and he tugs the leads away from the otters, clapping a hand to JT’s shoulder and pulling him into a quick hug. Compher sends a confused look at him but all Erik does is pat him a few more times on the shoulder before pushing him forward to join the other rookies.

Erik is in no way capable of dealing with pining, not with the rookies, not with…

He checks his phone again.

Nate’s written back, _on our way. i told him he couldn’t come. i think hes coming just to yell at u now. u’ve been warned._

Erik sends back a thumbs up emoji and pockets his phone.

Yeah, Erik doesn’t do pining. He’s too old for that shit.

* * *

They wind their way through the sea lion and tiger exhibits and Erik does his best to hurry them past the Przewalski’s horses without incident. He almost manages it, too, but just as he’s in the clear, a throaty female voice calls out,

“Энэ юу вэ? Эрхэм ээ! Шар үс!”

Josty gasps and for one bright shining moment Erik thinks everything is fine, everything is normal, some tourist behind them is just yelling at her husband, but then he says, “Wow, that was a pretty loud neigh!”

“Someone’s talkative,” Kerfy agrees, tugging at the leash in Erik’s hand as he goes to lean up against the fence.

The horse continues to yell at Erik in a language he can’t understand. Despite this, Erik can’t help but notice how beautiful the horse is: stockier than domestic horses, with stronger legs than racehorses. It’s a gorgeous dun color, with a sandy stomach, dark muzzle, and black mane and tale. There’s something wild about it that’s arresting, even as the horse keeps up its human yelling.

Kerfy, ever the _Harvard University_ nerd, goes to read the information panel about the horses. “Most Przewalski’s horses live in Mongolia,” he reads out, nasally and dorky as always.

“Too bad I don’t understand Mongolian,” Erik says, as casually as he can while lifting his sunglasses to look the nearest horse in the eyes.

“I don’t think that really matters since it’s in English,” Kerfy says but the horse huffs, shakes out its bristly mane, and says in a clear Floridian accent, “Are you Erik?”

Erik’s eyes cut over to the rookies. When he sees that all four of them are messing with the educational tools by the information panel, spinning the spinners like they’re the three to seven year olds the child leashes are meant for, he looks back to the horse and nods. The horse stomps her hooves and shouts over her shoulder at the other three horses in the exhibit. Their ears prick up and they trot over to the fence.

Off to the side, Erik can see Sam take out his phone and snap a few pictures.

“You’re the one we heard about from Fara,” the first horse says.

“She’s a zebra,” another horse adds helpfully, stretching his neck out in the direction of the zebra exhibit. He sounds like an eight year old and Erik can’t help but be charmed by him and his soft dark eyes. His ears flick towards the rookies and he turns to look at them. “Are these your young? Where’s your mate?”

“Does your mate always leave you to take care of your herd alone?” the third horse demands in a deep male voice.

“You _do_ need our help,” the last horse says with a distinctly teenage huff, stomping her hooves so that dust rises around the small family.

Erik is at a loss. He can’t talk to these horses to tell them how very _wrong_ they are because the rookies are right there, not to mention the handful of other people wandering through this part of the zoo. He shifts on his feet and opts to say nothing, waiting for the rookies to finish messing around with the sliders and flippable “Did You Know?” placards.

“Sir?” the youngest horse says again. He bounces on his front hooves impatiently and reaches over to gnaw on his sister’s ear.

Their mom nudges her nose between them and her son reaches up to gnaw at her ear instead. “Wherever your mate is, you should tell them that raising a herd of young is a responsibility that must be shared between mates. One mate can’t do all the work.”

“Being mated is about sharing the work, as well as sharing the successes and learning from the failures.”

“When they say failures,” the teenage horse says to Erik in a conspiratory tone, “they’re talking about Batu.”

Her brother, Batu, rears back with a wordless whinny of indignation and chases her around the enclosure. The father horse sighs and trots after them, his black tail swishing in the sunlight.

The last horse looks at him for a moment more before inclining her head and trotting after her family. “Don’t put it all on yourself, Erik!” she calls out.

Well, Erik thinks as he replaces his sunglasses. At least these horses weren’t possessed by the ghost of some fucking Dickensian orphan, so that’s a step up. He turns away from the exhibit to find Kerfy, Compher, and Josty staring at him. Off to the side, Sam is tapping away furiously at his phone.

Erik should probably be worried about that.

“EJ,” Compher says, real slow, “are you done communing with the horses?”

“Did they tell you any secrets?” Josty asks.

Erik ignores them and starts walking down the path towards the elephants, tugging the rookies along after him. Elephants, though wise, probably won’t try to sell him relationship advice _or_ self-help guidance.

He pulls his phone out again and ignores the slew of texts from the group chat—Sam _had_ been up to something, that devious little angel—to open the thread with Nate.

_we’re by the elephant house._

_please hurry brutes is making big plans for next halloween’s costume and i don’t want to be part of it._

_this is cute btw_ , the last text reads, followed by a screenshot of Sam’s snapstory. It’s Erik, sunglasses pushed into his hair, leaning against the fence and making intense and soulful eye contact with the family of horses. It’s captioned, _Erik Johnson: confirmed horse girl._

Erik is beginning to rethink his decision to allow Sam to roam free. Perhaps he has been too lenient a father-figure.

* * *

By the time they make it to the elephant house, Nate and Tyson are waiting for them, talking animatedly about—based purely on their body language and hand-motions—a paintball fight between the Canucks and sentient vacuum cleaners.

Erik does not pretend to understand their relationship.

As he and the rookies walk up the path, Erik steadfastly ignores the happy swoop of his stomach when Nate turns to smile at them, a wide toothy thing that shrinks into a smaller smirk when he meets Erik’s eyes. Erik sidesteps Tyson as he is about to launch into a tirade about being left out of a very important zoo field trip to bump shoulders with Nate.

“Did you have to bring him?” he asks with an exaggerated eyeroll at Tyson who splutters indignantly.

“He drove me here,” Nate replies. He takes in the four rookies milling around behind Erik, leashes pulled taught as they surround Tyson to chirp and be chirped. Nate scrunches up his nose and says, like he’s trying to be accepting but can’t quite manage it, “Is this, like, a _scene_ thing?”

“I’m saving them from themselves,” Erik responds easily. He carefully untangles Kerfy’s leash and presses it into Nate’s hand. “Here, do your part as an A and help me.”

Nate looks down at the leash in his hand and back up at EJ. His nose scrunches again before his lips twist to the side in a sweet smile. “You’re so weird,” he says. He presses his shoulder against Erik’s and doesn’t move it until the rookies and Tyson pull them further into the zoo.

 

**v.**

The boys put together a birthday party for him, which is. It’s thoughtful. Good team-building, luring him away from his own house while the rookies set up the party tent in his backyard and the caterers arrange nutritionist-approved party trays. They’re coming down to the wire, hanging onto that playoff spot by the skin of their teeth. Everyone’s tired and worn down, and they’ve all got that hungry, desperate look in their eyes. Erik _hurts_ , day in and day out, new injuries on top of old injuries on top of almost injuries on top of injuries his body knows he’s going to get in the future.

God, he’s old.

It’ll be worth it if they make the playoffs this year, if they make it past the first round of playoffs this year, but that doesn’t mean he won’t complain about his garbage body falling apart.

“It’s not a _garbage_ body,” Nate says with a roll of his eyes as he takes an obscenely large bite out of a hummus-laden carrot stick.

Not to be outdone, Erik shoves his own carrot stick in his mouth and chews. “It _is_. If I so much as stub my toe one more time, my entire leg is going to fall off.” He grins when Nate makes a disgusted noise at him, sure the orange pulp is showing in the gap. 

“You’re so gross. Are you sure you’re turning thirty-one, not twelve?”

“Age is just a number.”

Nate tilts his head and gives him what Erik feels is a significant look. Erik pops in another carrot stick and goes to find the beer cooler.

* * *

It’s a great party, one that Gabe probably planned from his sickbed, except.

_Except._

“Erik! Erik, you _have_ to listen to me, you’re going about this all wrong!”

Except fucking Landesnerd had gone and rented a _petting zoo pony_. Erik _knows_ that Gabe didn’t personally interview and pick out the pony, but it feels like he did because the pony is fucking obnoxious and clearly out to get him. It’s shaggy and pinto and gorgeous in the way all well cared for horses are, and it won’t stop following Erik around.

“You aren’t being mean enough. How will he know that you really like him if you don’t rough him up a little?”

No one has _ever_ accused Erik of not being mean enough, so clearly the thing’s full of shit.

* * *

Erik has survived _so much_ in his life. He survived being a dumbass twenty year old and the subsequent trade. He’s survived seasons of heartbreak, of injury, of Patrick Roy. He’s survived _years_ of being in the same locker room as a naked Nathan MacKinnon. Hell, he survived almost a decade of _Matt fucking Duchene_.

Erik is a strong motherfucker. A goddamn warrior.

That said, if he has to endure another ten minutes of this goddamn pony’s Cosmo Sex Tips for Horses and EJ spiel, Erik _will_ go postal.

* * *

He’s not particularly proud of this, but halfway through the pony’s third monologue on how best to mount Nate, Erik breaks. He can’t go on living like this.

So he tracks down Tyson, because if there’s anyone on the team who’ll be stoked to find out animals can talk, it’ll be Tyson Barrie. Erik finds him by the dessert table, of course, and drawls out, “Hey, bud, can I talk with you for a minute?”

Tyson raises his perfectly arched eyebrows at him but he shrugs out a “sure” so easily. He stuffs another brownie in his mouth and wipes his fingers off on his fucking floral Hawaiian shirt, and follows him into the house. Erik triple checks to make sure the horse isn’t following and leads them to the office on the first floor. He closes the door and takes a deep, fortifying breath.

“I’m going to tell you something right now, and it’s going to sound like I’m joking or pulling a prank on you, but I promise, this is very real.”

Tyson squints at him in the dim light of the office. He’s got a smear of chocolate on his cheek. “Is this where you tell me that you want to bone down my best friend? Because let me tell you, buddy, that’s not news.”

“What? No. No!”

“Yeah, dude, you do. And it’s not that I blame you, Nate Dogg is one tall drink of water, a fine piece of ass, and a sweetheart to boot. Big, blond, and beautiful. The whole package. A package I’d want to unwrap myself, but sadly I am hopelessly devoted to my beautiful girlfriend, and he is in a monogamous relationship with his Sidney Crosby poster.”

“...Monogamous?”

Tyson shrugs. “Tragically, yes. But maybe he’d be willing to open up the relationship if the right tall, toothless, blond hunk were to _get off his ass and ask him out_.”

And. There’s a lot to unpack here, from the fact that Erik’s been pathetic enough that _Tyson Barrie_ can pick up on it, to the pointed look Tys is throwing his way, to—

“That’s not what I wanted to talk about.”

“Well too bad, Johnson, because clearly _someone_ needs to talk to you about this—”

“I get enough of this from the horses!”

That, at least, gets Tyson to shut up. Erik closes his eyes so he can’t see whatever dumb thoughts are playing across Tyson’s face and tells him about the horses, the bad advice, and _okay_ , also his feelings for Nate.

It takes a while for Erik to finish, but when he does, he feels somehow better. So _this_ was what the therapist was talking about when they suggested he stop bottling up his feelings until his eventual death. He’s not totally convinced this is the way to go, but he guess he can see the appeal. When Erik opens his eyes Tyson looks more contemplative than mocking or concerned, which in and of itself is concerning.

“What about dogs? Do they talk to you? Do they...do they tell you to kill people? Listen,” he says in response to the look Erik gives him, “It’s a valid question. Plenty of people kill because dogs tell them to.”

“Who?”

“Well there was this one guy in Queens. Landy made me watch a true crime documentary about it,” he says defensively, arms crossing as he gets that look on his face that’s two parts stubborn and one part indignant.

Erik has a lot to say about making sure Mel turns on the parental locks for the streaming devices at Gabe’s house, but before he can say any of those things, an ominous _clip clop_ echoes on the hardwood hallway leading to the office.

“Hey. Heeeey. Are you in here? I thought of something else you should try. Now hear me out, but have you considered a stud pile?”

“Oh fuck,” Erik whispers.

“Oh my god,” Tyson says, his eyes wide. “Oh my god, what is he saying? Can you introduce me?”

“Absolutely not.” Erik crosses the room to lock the door and lean against it. Barricading the door would probably be what one would call an overreaction. Tyson looks halfway to shitting himself in delight and terror and Erik shushes him as the hoofbeats slow to a stop just outside the door.

“Erik?” the horse calls. “Erik open up. I just want to talk.”

The door rattles in its frame as the horse kicks it from the outside. It jolts EJ from where he’s braced against it, and he tries very hard not to think about what damage horse hooves can inflict upon the very expensive wood finish.

“Eriiiiiik,” the horse whines again.

“Is he—oh my god, is he telling you to kill?” Tyson asks.

“I need you to shut the fuck up, Barrie.”

“Let me in! Let me innn—” 

The horse’s manic wailing is cut off abruptly by a soft, “What’s up, buddy? You looking for someone?”

It’s Nate and oh boy, that’s _just_ what Erik needs now. He stares up at the ceiling and listens as Nate talks to the horse like it’s a fucking dog, all soft and lilting and gentle. And goddamnit, but that sure does something to Erik, _emotionally_. Horses may have been making his life significantly more difficult lately, but. They’re still horses, majestic and strong. Erik still loves them, and to hear Nate being soft to a lost, obnoxious petting zoo pony?

Nate might as well have ripped the heart from Erik’s chest.

“I’m looking for someone, too,” Nate continues on the other side of the door and Erik looks back at Tyson just in time to see him waggle his eyebrows indecently.

Erik makes a face back and unlocks the door, sticks his head out in the hallway. Nate pops up from where he’d been leaning down to pet at the pony’s forelock and the smile on his face is bright and crooked. Fuck, Erik’s stupid old heart can’t handle this. Nate says, “Oh, I was looking for you! You ditched your own party, dude.”

“Sorry, I had to, uh, take a call from my cousin.”

Nate smiles and accepts this and looks back down at the horse, only a little bigger than a great dane, leaning against him and swishing his tail. He gestures at the horse. “Uh, is he supposed to be in here? Like, has your house been horse-proofed?”

“Whose hasn’t?” Erik says. “Besides, who am I to tell a horse where it can and can’t go?”

“Of _course_. Well, hurry up. We’re missing you out there.” Nate shuffles his weight and reaches out to glance a punch that’s far too gentle off Erik’s shoulder.

“I’ll be done soon,” he says to Nate, and then with a pointed glance at the horse he adds, “Just wait for me outside.”

“You’re not getting out of this Erik,” the horse says. “We will have words later.”

Erik ducks back into the office as the horse attempts to execute a three point turn in the hallway. When he looks up, Tyson is staring at him, something inscrutable in his expression. This is a fucking first since Tyson always wears his heart on his sleeve. Erik brushes past him to collapse in one of the leather chairs across from the desk.

Being known was exhausting. No wonder he stuck with his usual enigmatic schtick.

“Look,” Tyson says at last and Erik turns to him. His eyes have gone soft and brown, like he’s talking to a rookie after a bad turnover. “I’m on your side, dude. Nate’s my best friend, but you’re my friend too, and I want you to both be happy. Maybe you should just listen to the horses and shoot your shot.”

“You’re telling me to trust the horses?”

“Horses are to be respected but under no circumstances can they be trusted.” Tyson says this like _he’s_ the horse expert in the room. He pats EJ on the shoulder and with this parting wisdom walks out of the office. EJ watches him go and thinks, huh. Listen to the horses.

Whythe fuck not.

* * *

A cheer rises up when he steps out of the house and makes his way to the tent. It’s led mostly by the rookies, all of whom have taken advantage of the party and the open coolers, but Nate’s smile is particularly wide when Erik makes his way in his direction.

“How’s your cousin?” Nate asks and hands him a beer. Erik glances at the horse, which is staring him down from across the yard where Z is balancing his baby on its back, and throws his arm over Nate’s shoulder, jostling him and pulling him closer. Nate shoves back but settles in far quicker than Erik expected.

“She’s alright. Just wanted to congratulate me on surviving another revolution of the earth around the sun. The usual.” 

“‘Another revolution of the earth around the sun?’” Nate wrinkles his nose up at him. “You’re such a nerd, Johnson. You’ve got everyone thinking that you’re so cool and wise, but I’m not fooled.”

“Just admit that you’re jealous of my superior American education, MacKinnon.”

Nate snorts but says nothing. He brings his beer bottle up and Erik watches him take a swig. He lets his eyes trace the graceful line of Nate’s neck, up over the swell of his Adam’s apple and his strong jaw, settling in on where pink lips are sealed against the mouth of the bottle. Even as Nate swallows and brings the bottle down, Erik lets himself keep looking. Nate meets his gaze and flushes, looking inexplicably pleased to have Eric’s focus on him.

Erik Johnson is thirty-one years old. It is a beautiful sunny day in Denver and he has a beautiful sunny boy in his arms. Life is, against all odds, looking up.

“Now bite him!” the horse yells across the yard.

Erik cheerfully flips it the bird and hopes it translates.

 

**vi.**

The season ends sooner than anyone would like. Until they’ve got the Cup in their hands, any end is going to feel too soon.

Erik goes back to his ranch feeling raw and a little bit broken. The aches in his joints are deep, the circles under his eyes are expansive, and the guilt balled up deep in his stomach when he sees Nate blinking back frustrated tears as he skates off the ice for the last time is devastating. They barely speak during clean out, checking in with the boys as best they can through their own disappointment.

So Erik packs up his truck, his dogs, and his life and leaves with little more than a _see you later mackinnon_ text.

* * *

Erik doesn’t know if he was expecting anything less, but the horses keep talking to him. They’d laid off some after his birthday, and then stopped entirely during the Avs’ all-too-brief playoff run. A police horse in Calgary had given him an over the top wink before Game Five but that had been it. Even back at the ranch, most of his horses are careful not to mention Nate or the end of the season.

Startlingly, Erik finds that he almost misses nosy busybodies yelling unsolicited advice at him.

“Dick pics, Erik!” Biz Nasty hollers from the next stall over. “Who can say no to dick pics?!”

Almost.

* * *

Usually Erik has the ranch manager hire one of the neighborhood kids to help groom the horses after school and on the weekends, but when Trey goes on vacation with his family the first week of June, Erik doesn’t bother hiring anyone else. He just puts on his grungiest jeans and oldest Golden Gophers shirt and treks out to the stables. If he leaves his phone at home, it’s just so he won’t get any notifications about the Cup final.

The horses whinny their greeting once he ducks into the cool shade of the stable, a chorus of horsey voices ringing out, “Hey, Erik!” “EJ!” and “The motherfucker is back.”

Erik learned quickly that Toothless Wonder does not appreciate his name.

He grabs a bucket of grooming tools and makes his way to the stall at the far end of the stable. It’s quieter back here and well lit. Motes of dust and bits of straw dance in the rays of sunlight filtering in from a window high up on the stable wall. As Erik gets closer, a big brown head swings over the stall door. Erik’s not allowed to have a favorite horse, but Macwinnon’s as close as he’ll let himself get.

He rubs at Macwinnon’s velvety soft nose and scratches at his neck. “Hey,” he says, “you have a good day at training?”

Macwinnon huffs and shakes his forelock out of his eyes. “It was alright. You won’t _believe_ what Kelly made me do today.”

Erik works on removing the ground-in dirt from the horse’s coat as Macwinnon goes on about the training exercises, the turf, the weather, everything. When he finishes up with the curry comb and moves onto the soft-bristled brush, MacWinnon goes noticeably quiet. When Erik reaches his left flank, MacWinnon asks, “Have you talked to Nate?”

And there it is. Erik is honestly shocked that Macwinnon was able to last as long as he did without bringing it up. 

“We’ve chatted,” Erik says coolly. “I’ve been burning him on the reg for his shitty instagram comments.”

“You _know_ that’s not what I’m talking about. Did you ever get around to asking him out?”

“Asking a teammate during playoffs didn’t seem fair, bud. There’s a lot of pressure riding on him, I didn’t want to add to that.”

(“You could be riding him too, you coward!” Biz hollers from the other end of the stable. Erik and Macwinnon ignore him.)

“Fine. I still think that’s a stupid reason, but fine.” Macwinnon snorts and shakes out his mane. “Then what about now?” When Erik remains silent, the horse snorts again and stamps his hoof, dangerously close to Erik’s sneaker. “The season’s over, you’re not in the playoffs—”

“Way to rub it in, Mack.”

“—and you have plenty of time before training camp. What’s stopping you, Erik?”

Erik looks up from Macwinnon’s muscular chestnut shoulder to see that the horse has craned his head around to look at him. The horse seems to stare in his soul, but not in the invasive sort of way Oliver at the hospital had caught him in his haunted horsey gaze. It’s warm and inviting, like slipping into a hot bath at the end of a hard day. It doesn’t take much more of that stare for Erik to spill his guts to Macwinnon.

“He’s so good. Not just at hockey, but just...fucking everything. It’s almost unfair, you know? Here’s this fucking twenty three year old who can embarrass guys who have been in the league for years longer than him, and he’s only getting better. I’m just some...I don’t know, some toothless idiot too scared to go for it. I’m nearly a decade older than him, and that’s a big fuckin’ difference in hockey years. Horse years, too,” he adds at Macwinnon’s look. Erik pauses, the brush going still in his hands. At last he says, so softly he can barely hear himself, “He might have been interested but that’ll fade when he meets better people.”

Macwinnon blinks at him sadly, all long lashes framing liquid dark eyes. “You’re a moron,” the horse says with heartbreaking fondness.

All Erik can say to this is, “I know.”

Up near the front of the stables, the horses’ voices rise again in a cacophony of greetings. The stable manager must be back to help with the grooming.

Erik keeps grooming Macwinnon, letting the noises of the stable wash over him. He loses himself in the methodical work of grooming Macwinnon, 

“So you really did name a horse after me, huh.”

Surprised, Erik drops the brush.

He looks up and oh, there Nate is, leaning against the half door of the stall. It’s barely a month into the off-season and he looks golden again, flushed with sun. He’s bounced back from his playoff leanness, filling out the shoulders and chest of his shirt. He’ll only bulk up more over the rest of the summer, Erik knows, but he looks so good right now.

He always looks good.

“Yes, I’m hoping you’ll take inspiration from what a real winner looks like,” Erik says after only a brief pause.

Nate snorts and reaches out to Macwinnon, fingers extended like he’s greeting a new dog. Macwinnon turns to Erik just long enough to give him an eyeroll before nudging at Nate’s fingers indulgently. Nate beams and Erik’s stomach swoops nauseatingly.

Erik bends down to retrieve the brush and to hide whatever his face is doing. He resumes brushing Macwinnon’s coat and says as casually as he can, “I wasn’t expecting you. Most people call or text before they visit, Nathan.”

“I did. _Most_ people keep their phone on them,” Nate snarks back. Erik turns to him with a raised eyebrow. He flushes and adds, “Well, I texted when I was on the way over from the airport. Everything else was a little…”

 _“Spur_ of the moment?”

“I changed my mind, I’m leaving.”

“Aw, Mack, don’t be like that,” Erik grins. Nate doesn’t make any move to leave and Erik puts down the brush, goes to lean up against the stall door. They’re separated by two inches of wood and about half a foot of empty air. “You can’t come all this way to see little ol’ me and not tell me why.”

“Who said I was here to see you? Maybe I wanted to come see Macwinnon, check up on his training regimine. We can exchange nutrition tips.”

“Alfalfa,” Macwinnon whinnies, flicking an ear back at Erik, “just a fucking shit ton of alfalfa.”

Nate straightens, mouth flattening out. He looks between Erik and the horse and Erik suddenly knows, he just _knows_ , that Tys fucking snitched on him. Tyson ratted him out, spilled the beans, let the cat out of the bag.

Horse out of the barn?

So much for d-men solidarity.

“Uh,” Nate starts then stops. He swallows and sends an unreadable sidelong glance Erik’s way before turning back to the horse. “So a little Barrie, uh, birdie told me that you can hear horses?”

“I know this is shocking, Nate, but most people without hearing damage can hear horses.”

“Shut up, jackass. I mean that you can hear them talk. That you talk with them.”

Erik turns to face Nate, takes in his profile, tracing the shape of his big strong nose with his eyes. His eyebrows are furrowed but the line of his shoulders is loose. He doesn’t look like he’s about to run screaming into the hills.

Unbidden, Erik thinks about the wild horses at the zoo. _Don’t put it all on yourself, Erik._

He takes a deep breath in and exhales. “Yeah. They talk to me. It started back in the pre-season. Actually, most of the time, they won’t fucking shut up.”

“You mean horses aren’t as majestic as you’ve always thought they are?”

“Of course they’re majestic. Majestically obnoxious.”

Nate snorts when Macwinnon bites out an offended, “Hey!”

They go quiet until Erik offers up, “They, uh. They talk about you a lot. It’s mostly bullshit romantic advice. The pony at my birthday party had a lot of weird sex tips, too.”

With a start, Nate turns to face him, eyes blue and wide in the softly filtered sunlight. Erik sees his face a lot but it only just now occurs to him how much Nate has grown into his face. He’s lost the baby fat that had stubbornly clung to his cheeks his first few seasons. Nate is now a man, a fact that makes Erik’s heart beat like horse hooves pounding on the racetrack.

Unfortunately, Erik finds that he’s excited to see how much more Nate will grow into himself.

It’s very sentimental, and very gay.

Nate swallows, blinks up at him.

“But, like. Why...me?”

“Horses can just _tell_ when you’re in love,” Erik snipes back and then freezes, because fuck. _Fuck_. His shoulders go up and he turns back to Macwinnon, ignoring the horse’s encouraging snort.

But Nate just makes a soft “oh” in response. Out of the corner of his eye, Erik sees him reach a hand forward to let Macwinnon nose at his fingers again. He huffs out a laugh when the horse lips at him and Erik can’t bear _not_ to look at him, not when Nate is being so soft with his horse.

Nate is still looking at him, bright-eyed and flushed and quietly happy. Something in his expression makes Erik’s muscles tense in anticipation, like he’s on the ice, crouched down and ready for the puck to drop.

“They can, huh?”

Nate deliberately drops his eyes to Erik’s lips, bites his own. Time goes syrupy slow. Through the rushing in his ears, Erik can hear Macwinnon whicker, “He wants you to fucking kiss him, you idiot.”

“What’s the horse telling you now, Erik?” Nate murmurs.

Erik doesn’t answer, just cups his hand around Nate’s sharp jaw and leans down to press his lips to Nate’s.

The slide of their lips is gentle and soft, Erik’s still too scared to go for what he really wants. Nate bounces up onto the balls of his feet, pressing in harder. Distantly Erik hears his knees knock into the wood of the stall door, but that is so far beyond what Erik cares about that he just pushes in closer.

Erik can’t even bring himself to worry about the fact that his teeth aren’t in.

As they part, Macwinnon neighs and stomps his hooves. Erik looks over and laughs out, “Yeah bud, now you and Biz Nasty can go tell your little horse network to stop bugging me about this.”

Macwinnon huffs, whickers, but doesn’t…actually say anything.

Before Erik can get caught up on this, Nate pulls him back into another kiss, much wetter and deeper than the first, and yeah. Erik can work with this.

* * *

Nate is a bossy motherfucker. Any idiot with an NHL subscription can see that. He alters between going huffy and red-faced and turning stubbornly silent when he doesn’t get his way. He pushes the boys around in the locker room and on the ice, adjusting them until they match the play diagrams in his head. He’s bossy and stubborn and he will keep working at a problem until he solves it or outplays it into the fucking dust.

On the ice, as a teammate, this personality makes Nate at once endearing, amazing, and frustrating.

In the stable, as Nate pushes Erik into the wall of an empty stall, it is incandescently, searingly hot.

Erik hasn’t gotten this hard this fast since he was nineteen fucking years old.

Nate kisses and kisses him, using his broad shoulders and thick thighs to box Erik in, like Erik isn’t four inches and a dozen or so pounds heavier than him. Erik gets one hand in Nate’s hair and the other up his shirt, on that warm golden skin. It feels like heaven and Erik traces the long lines of his muscles and ribs.

They make out for long minutes, Erik drinking in the sights and sounds of Nate under his fingertips. Nate dips his head to skim his lips along the tendons of Erik’s neck. He bites here and there, almost like he can’t help it. Erik’s hips jolt with every press of teeth and he digs his fingers deeper into Nate’s hair. Hands trace down Erik’s shirt, rucking up the hem. One of Nate’s hands rests on Erik’s belt buckle and, after a breathless moment, he dips his fingers just into the waistline of the jeans.

“Wait, wait,” Erik gasps. Nate dutifully stops, puts both hands back on Erik’s waist like a gentleman, but the look on his face clearly reads that he would really rather not.

“Are you okay? Am I going too fast?”

“We can’t just do this in front of the children, Nathan.”

“The children? What children? Are you, oh my god, are you talking about your _horses_?”

A few stalls down, one of the horses neighs, loud and long and shrill. Erik would put good money on it being Biz Nasty.

“They’re young and impressionable, Nathan.” Erik takes no small amount of pleasure in watching Nate’s face get redder as he frowns up at him. His lips are bitten pink and bruised and his hair is fucked up out of its usual styling. It’s a good look.

Somehow, the set of Nate’s jaw gets even more stubborn. The grip he has around Erik’s waist tightens as he pushes up on the balls of his feet to drag his lips across Erik’s jaw and up to his ear. The movement pushes their hips together and Erik has to bite back a groan.

“Erik.” Nate’s voice is deep and rough and Erik can’t help the shiver that races down his back just from hearing his name. “I have wanted this since long before the horses started telling you to tap this. Please, just—let me.”

“Well when you put it like that,” Erik says, breathless.

Nate smiles at him sweetly and leans back in.

* * *

Most stories with a happily ever after end with the star-crossed lovers riding off into the sunset together.

There’s riding involved, and a sunset after that. Nate holds him close as the light fades and the crickets start to chirp. None of the horses try to talk to them.

Erik is indescribably happy.

He’ll take it.

**Author's Note:**

> you can find me [on tumblr](http://dalmatienne.tumblr.com), where i am extremely emotional about my children the carolina hurricanes


End file.
